by Luke Kennard
‘What’s this?’ said Karl.
‘Call it marriage counselling,’ said Janna. ‘I’m going to ask you a series of questions.’
‘Right.’
‘You’ve been faithful to each other?’ Janna made eye contact with Karl and held her fountain pen to her lips.
‘Yes.’
‘You’re certain?’
‘I’m certain I have. I can’t speak for Genevieve. I believe she has.’
‘I have a feeling you wouldn’t mind. If she hadn’t.’
‘What makes you say that?’
‘I have a feeling you’d actually quite like it. Being cuckolded.’
‘Stop.’ Karl hit the pause button and Janna laughed.
‘I’m sorry, I’m sorry. Oh, your face!’
‘What? I’m smiling.’
‘You look completely terrified! That was wrong of me. I’m incorrigible. I’m sorry. Do you want to stop?’
‘No, no, of course not.’
‘God, you’re so obliging. It’s a wonder you’re not more successful.’
‘You make a pretty odd marriage counsellor.’
‘You’re supposed to react like this. I’m supposed to provoke you, that’s the purpose of the exercise. When a priest is going for ordination they pick his faith apart and he has to rebuild it. Same with how we see our relationships.’
‘This is part of The Transition?’
‘You have to face issues you’ve been burying. Your teeth, your marriage, everything. But you hit the stop button whenever I go too far – that’s good.’
‘I’m okay to carry on now.’
Janna pressed record again.
‘She flirts. She really flirts. You’re okay with that?’
‘I don’t see it that way. I don’t see it as flirting.’
‘You mean you don’t mind?’
‘There’s nothing to mind. If you call it flirting I’m sure I do it too.’
‘No you don’t.’
‘I don’t?’
‘Flirting would involve a modicum of guile. You’re very transparent.’
‘Am I?’
‘Where do you draw the line?’
Janna leaned forward and kissed him on the lips, quickly but so softly that it felt pleasing and right, like joining two pieces of sky in a jigsaw puzzle.
‘There?’
‘Why did you …’
‘Will you tell her I kissed you?’
Karl thought about it.
‘No.’
‘Because you liked it?’
‘I think there are some things you don’t need to tell someone.’
‘So you’ll keep it a secret.’
‘I just won’t tell her.’
‘A sin of omission.’
‘Oh, come on.’
‘It was a tiny little kiss. You’d greet your mother that way.’
‘Which is exactly why I won’t tell her. It’s insignificant.’
‘When she asks what we did together.’
‘Is Stu doing the same thing to her?’
‘You’ll have to ask Genevieve. Maybe she’ll think it’s insignificant too.’
‘So what did you do with the chief?’
‘We went to the cinema,’ said Genevieve, dropping her shoulder bag in the corner of the bedroom.
‘Oh. What did you see?’
‘I don’t even know what it was called. Blunt Force Genital Trauma, I think.’ She unzipped her boots and kicked them off. ‘There were scenes where the antagonist swung the protagonist around and around and then let go and he slammed into a wall and some of the brickwork fell down.’
‘I don’t really understand why he took you to the cinema.’
‘He could see I was low. He said we’d go to the cinema and pretend we’d done the session. Which was sweet of him, I thought.’
‘Hmm.’
‘What did Janna do to you?’
‘Some messed-up marriage counsellor role-play thing.’
‘Ha ha! She said she’d do that.’
‘She kissed me.’
‘What?’
‘I wasn’t going to tell you.’
‘That bitch,’ said Genevieve. ‘I’m going to seduce her husband.’
‘You’re funnier when you’re depressed,’ said Karl.
‘How did she kiss you?’
‘Sit still.’
Karl leaned in and kissed Genevieve sharply on the lips.
‘Like that?’ Genevieve had her eyes closed. She sounded almost disappointed.
‘Mm.’
‘Well, that’s not so bad, I suppose,’ she said.
‘I think she only did it as a test – to see if I’d tell you,’ said Karl.
‘We’ll pretend,’ said Genevieve, ‘that you didn’t. Why don’t you call her bluff? Encourage her. Act like you’ve fallen for her.’
‘THE THING ABOUT LYING,’ said Janna, the next evening, ‘is that it’s habit-forming. I used to lie to Stu a lot, even though I didn’t need to. If I bought some shoes I’d tell him they were in the sale and I’d halve the price. He wasn’t even asking me; I’d volunteer the information and I’d lie about it.’
‘I do things like that all the time,’ said Karl. He rubbed his hands together, one of which was doused in sandalwood oil, and began working on Janna’s back.
‘Full of knots,’ he said, as soon as he reached her neck. It was something you had to say. You say whisky is smooth, you say someone’s back is full of knots.
‘But then one day – don’t hold back, Karl, I need it – one day I found the invoice for this lining he’d bought. It was for one of his silly cars – this black fur lining for the inside, all over it, the ceiling, the door trim, shaggy black hair, so it feels like you’re driving around in some kind of cocoon. Disgusting. Guess how much the shitty fur lining was?’
‘God, I don’t know. A hundred?’
‘Another zero. It looked like troll hair. You know his dream is to introduce Rat Look to the yachty crowd. Can you imagine? A Rat Look yacht? For all I know he’s probably got one docked somewhere. Why did you and Genevieve get married?’
‘We … loved each other,’ said Karl.
‘But why marriage? I don’t understand why anyone would get married nowadays. Is she religious?’
Karl worked his thumbs hard into Janna’s shoulder blades.
‘There’s something to be said for making it really, really difficult to leave someone, isn’t there?’ he said.
‘Higher up. That’s romantic.’
‘I love you so much that if, one day, I desperately want to leave you, I won’t be able to do it without a humiliating legal battle,’ said Karl. ‘But yes, she is religious. She never talks about it.’
Janna was small and angular and it felt wrong using any kind of force. While they weren’t so different in build there was something more robust about Genevieve’s back – her spine was less visible. He took a course a year ago because she liked it so much and he wanted to make sure he didn’t mess up her back by kneading and punching it without any education. It was an anniversary present.
‘It just feels like such a throwback,’ said Janna. ‘Ooh, more of those, please.’
‘Twists? I’m sorry if my generation let you down,’ he said. ‘I’ve been thinking about what you said, about using my time here. I’m going to look into coding.’
‘Oh, Karl, that’s brilliant,’ said Janna. ‘A little lower. There. Really try to hurt me. That’s such good news – I mean it.’
‘I told her you kissed me.’
‘Ohhhh, there again. Again. What did she say?’
‘She was fine with it.’
‘Would she be fine with this?’
‘A massage? Sure.’
Janna rolled over.
‘And now?’
‘So?’
‘You first.’
‘Tenpin bowling.’
‘Bullshit.’
‘For real,’ said Genevieve. ‘He massacred me, got like seven strikes
. We had burgers. It was a sixties-themed place.’
‘Wow.’
‘It was fun.’
‘It sounds like a date.’
‘And you?’
‘She was upset. Stressed.’
‘Aw. Poor Janna.’
‘She asked me if I ever got high. Stu has some really good weed.’
‘And?’
‘I offered to give her a massage.’
‘Karl Temperley, you ladykiller.’
‘Hmm. We took all the cushions off the leather sofas and she lay on them.’
‘Well, I bet she loves you now. You too tired to do me?’
‘What? No, of course not – I’ll get the oil.’
‘Nah,’ said Genevieve. ‘Actually I’m not in the mood. Let’s just go to sleep.’
HE DIDN’T TELL Genevieve about Janna rolling over and that he had said now I think probably yes, yes she would have a problem. And he didn’t tell her that Janna laughed and rolled onto her stomach again and said don’t stop, I was teasing, it’s not a big deal, right? It’s nothing you couldn’t see in the average museum or art gallery. He didn’t tell her that he worked on Janna’s back for another fifteen minutes and neither of them said anything. He didn’t tell her that actually he was about to go through to the kitchen and wash his hands when Janna, still face down and naked to the waist, said, ‘Karl?’
‘Yes?’
‘Can I ask you to do something weird?’
‘What?’
‘Write on me. On my back.’
Karl stood with his hands up and the oil slowly running down to his wrists. After a while he said, ‘I don’t have a pen.’
‘There’s one in my bag. There. Not the fountain pen. The biro. It has to be a biro.’
Karl didn’t move.
‘I know it’s weird,’ said Janna. ‘It would help me relax.’
‘I’m not judging,’ Karl shrugged. He wiped his hands on his jeans and started rifling through Janna’s handbag. Her BlackBerry, purse, packet of Polo mints, fountain pen. Biro. ‘What do you want me to write?’
‘Just …’ said Janna. ‘Just start at my neck. Write whatever you like. Write a poem.’
Karl touched the nib of the biro very gently to the nape of Janna’s neck and felt her tense.
Dear Stu,
He pressed lightly on Janna’s back and had to go back to redo several letters.
‘Just write normally,’ said Janna, ‘like you would on paper.’
This is ridiculous.
Karl pressed harder. Janna relaxed under the pen.
Is this some kind of test? Of what? If you’re swingers or something you can just come right out and say it.
He wrote.
If you’re just trying to see if we’ll stay faithful to one another I think that’s more than a little unethical. Ultimately the exceptional contour of Janna’s back and the pleasing feeling of skin under the pen nib cannot save this from being an awkward and unwelcome experience. Overall I give this part of The Transition one star out of five.
Yrs,
Karl
‘Okay?’ said Karl. ‘Janna?’
Janna was half asleep and murmured, ‘Don’t stop.’
‘I’m out of back,’ said Karl.
HE DIDN’T TELL Genevieve any of that, and yet after an hour with the lights out he could hear her making a strange sound in her sleep, a snuffling breath which he realised, when he put his hand on her back, was a gentle sobbing.
‘Karl,’ she said.
‘What? Genevieve? What’s wrong?’
‘Don’t. Don’t turn the light on. Just hold me.’
‘What is it? … Genevieve?’
‘What if I hadn’t always been faithful to you?’
‘What do you mean?’
‘What do you mean what do I mean? Just tell me.’
‘Are you telling me you’ve slept with someone else?’
‘What if something happened. Once. Or twice. When I was ill.’
‘Oh,’ said Karl. ‘I wouldn’t really think of that as you being unfaithful.’
‘Because you don’t believe it’s really me, when I’m ill?’
‘No.’
‘You think I’m possessed by a demon?’
‘No.’
‘It’s still me, Karl.’
‘You don’t even remember the conversations we have. It doesn’t feel like you at all.’
‘Okay.’
‘Okay?’
‘Yes.’
‘Good,’ said Karl, smiling. And he felt, as her shoulders relaxed against him and her breathing evened out into sleep, that it was very easy to be a good man.
23
‘OH WOW, £478,’ said Karl. ‘You’re doing really well.’
‘There are still some undervalued companies in the Eurozone,’ said Genevieve, and went back to her lesson plan.
‘Guys?’
‘Janna?’ Genevieve looked up again.
‘Guys?’
Karl rolled onto the floor and leaned over the entrance to the attic. Janna was hanging off the ladder, holding up a piece of ivory card. Her face was unnervingly close to his.
‘Hi Janna.’
‘We’re having a party,’ said Janna. ‘We’d be really happy if you could both make it.’
‘On a school night?’
‘Has to be, I’m afraid. Stars are aligned.’
Karl took the invitation and Janna said, ‘Good, then,’ and vanished down the stairs.
A Gathering
chez Janna and Stu
Sushi and Sashimi
Genevieve whipped it out of his hands.
‘Should we bring something?’ she said. ‘I mean get something? What’s the etiquette? Oh my God, are we going to meet their friends?’
‘You’ve cheered up,’ he said.
Genevieve smiled.
‘It’s lifted,’ she said.
‘A little suddenly.’
Genevieve mouthed fuck off.
Karl gathered a few quotations for the Henry James thesis. He wondered if the theme of ellipsis might be best explored with an elliptical essay, maybe even one which excised commentary altogether in favour of a series of curated quotations. He checked the institution. No. Too cute. Then he got distracted by another well-paid A-level commission on Anti-War Sentiment in the Great War Poets, which he estimated would take him forty minutes and in fact took thirty.
After work Genevieve offered to help Janna prepare the sushi while Stu and Karl moved the furniture around. Janna said that’s so sweet and touched Genevieve’s face. Now they were eating some samples of temaki.
‘This is really good,’ said Karl. ‘Are you formally trained?’
‘It’s a hobby,’ said Janna. ‘I worked in Japan for three years.’
‘It was a holiday from me, really,’ said Stu.
‘That’s more true than you know,’ said Janna.
‘So is this going to be other couples from The Transition?’ said Genevieve. ‘Other mentors?’
‘Oh God, no,’ said Janna. ‘It’s important to have some semblance of a life outside work. Just some friends.’
She sent Karl out to buy tonic water, which the Smart Fridge always forgot. At the front door she stopped him, gave him a £10 note and two little white pills.
‘What’s this?’
‘Will you do it with me?’ said Janna.
‘What is it?’
‘I can’t function socially without it. It makes everyone seem a little warmer, that’s all. I’ve done them a thousand times before – they’re weak-as.’
‘Weak ass?’
‘Weak-as; as weak as …’
‘As what?’
‘It’s a saying, dummy,’ said Janna. ‘Weak as fuck, I assume.’
‘Or a kitten, maybe,’ said Karl. ‘“Hard as”, I’ve heard before. Hard as nails. As fuck.’
Janna held a pill up to the misty sun and popped it. ‘I’d just feel better if I knew you were doing it too.’
‘Wha
t about Stu?’
‘He’s not really into pills,’ said Janna. ‘Actually he thinks they make me really annoying. So don’t mention it to him, okay?’
‘Ha ha,’ said Karl, tossing both pills into his mouth. ‘Understood.’ Janna patted him on the shoulder and, Karl couldn’t be sure, either winked or twitched.
THE HOUSE MADE SENSE at night with the side lights low: you felt at home wherever you stood, as if it was your own private area. There must have been thirty guests, disorientatingly various – he had just squeezed past a giant old man with a green velvet bow tie talking to a young blonde woman with dreadlocks and a hula hoop, only to come face to face with a vaguely Eastern European-looking boy in a leather jacket.
‘Sorry.’
‘No matter.’
Karl wasn’t sure if any of them knew about The Transition or who he and Genevieve were to Janna and Stu. He rather hoped not. The music was a quiet but obtrusive form of free jazz: chairs scraping, drum kits resolving into a beat then falling down the stairs, angry-goose saxophone. If Karl concentrated for too long he felt like it was undoing something in his head. Something he wanted to keep tied up. In the living room he needed to sit down, but there wasn’t any space. He looked into the grey abstract and felt something at his side. A very young woman with long white hair was ladling punch into his crystal glass from a bowl on an occasional table.
‘Thank you.’
He took a sip and detected the petroleum taste of rum, lime juice, triple sec, maybe. It was far too sweet.
‘Did you make this? It’s good.’
He looked at her. Her eyes were set far apart, which made her look even younger, but she couldn’t have been more than a teenager and her hair clearly wasn’t dyed – it had the uneven texture of real hair, like the long, kinked white hairs Karl used to pull out in the mirror until they became too numerous to do anything about. He remembered stories of people’s hair turning white after some kind of trauma, but he wasn’t sure if that really happened.
‘I’m just decanting.’
‘Well, thanks anyway. I’m Karl.’
‘Samphire.’
‘Like the seaweed?’
She smiled.
The woman next to Samphire grabbed her arm. She wore a similar dark lace dress, although her long hair was shiny and black. When she turned, Karl saw that she was old enough to be—